Purpose - This study aims to identify effective strategies and practices for higher education institutions (HEIs) to enhance their knowledge recipients’ knowledge absorptive capacity.Design/methodology/approach - Questionnaire surveys and interviews were conducted to examine the effectiveness of a knowledge transfer (KT) project and these were administered by HEIs in Hong Kong. Pre- and post-test questionnaire surveys with t-tests were used to evaluate changes in the knowledge absorptive capacity of 1,014 participants from 20 schools. Qualitative interviews were conducted to investigate school leaders’ perception of the effectiveness of the KT strategies.Findings - Results revealed significant differences between the pre- and post-tests in all the elements of absorptive capacity. The processes of knowledge acquisition, contextualisation, internalisation and externalisation in a closed-loop mechanism were identified as effective KT strategies. Conducting training programmes, workshops, consultations, work-based studies and presentation seminars were found to be effective KT practices to support the recipients in acquiring, contextualising, internalising and externalising knowledge.Practical implications - HEIs should provide consultative support to recipients by conducting work-based studies and presentations to enhance their knowledge absorptive capacities.Originality/value - This study contributes empirical evidence to validate the application of Liyanage et al.’s (2009) KT model to HEIs’ KT model for the purpose of designing KT activities and enhancing the absorption capacities of the recipients. This research contributes an empirical closed-loop KT model, effective KT strategies and practices for HEIs to support their knowledge recipients so that they can internalise the acquired knowledge. Copyright © 2020 Emerald Publishing Limited.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to systematically analyze the neoliberal challenges and problems facing public schools in the particular Hong Kong context.Design/methodology/approach: Based on a systematic and critical analysis on the history and socio-political context of Hong Kong's school policies and practice as well as the official documents and statistics, this paper examines the impacts of neoliberalism in four main aspects of school education in Hong Kong: school governance, accountability, privatization and government expenditure.Findings: Convergence, as well as deviation, on neoliberal globalization occurs in the particular Hong Kong context. School bureaucracy has irresistibly expanded. Policymakers have placed increasing emphasis on instrumentally evaluating schools while decentralizing, diversifying and privatizing education. School leadership has become focused solely on succeeding within those imposed performance management and metrics, pulling ahead of school competitions and prioritizing easily quantifiable and measurable tasks. Teachers have faced a potential threat from the loss of autonomy through the market logic and consumerist metrics. The rise of privatized education has further intensified school practices based on competitiveness and performativity. On the other hand, resource cutbacks and financial constraints – problems that are generally inflicted by neoliberal discourse – have rarely occurred in Hong Kong.Research limitations/implications: This study is part of concerted efforts in research that adopts the comparative and critical perspectives emerging from different social contexts to consider and flesh out how neoliberalism look across the school systems, how it challenges the systems differently, and how it evokes various responses from within the systems (Apple, 2001). Taken all the efforts together, a finely nuanced understanding of the trails of neoliberalism can help collectively re-discover school education as a social good

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to highlight the urgent need for a genuinely effective and attainable citizenship education model in Hong Kong’s schools, which focusses on promoting student participation in school governance. It is an empirical citizenship education management model for school leaders that illustrates the predictive effects of personally responsible, participatory, justice-oriented and patriotic citizenship, necessarily supported by school management practices, school ethos and teacher beliefs.Design/methodology/approach - A total of 3,209 students from 51 secondary schools in Hong Kong participated in a quasi-experimental design questionnaire survey. A structural equation model (SEM) was applied to confirm the model.Findings - The results of the SEM show that the values and cultural practices held by a school’s teachers drive the implementation of its citizenship education. Moreover, it is well known that organizational values can exert a powerful influence and it is the same within educational structures: management practices in schools have an impact on ethos, teachers’ beliefs and student participation in school governance.Practical implications - The paper provides practical proposals for school leaders to create opportunities for student participation in school governance.Originality/value - This study builds on existing literature and provides school leaders with a practical model for implementing student participation in school governance. Copyright © 2019 Emerald Publishing Limited.